Mehbooba, Farooq chair PDP, Oppn meetings; all 4 parties issue whips

*Amit Shah, top BJP, Cong leaders woo Independents

Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Apr 16: After by-election to Srinagar Lok Sabha seat, PDP-BJP coalition Government will face another political test tomorrow when 89 legislators will vote for two seats of the Legislative Council for which three candidates-two from ruling Alliance and one from Opposition Congress are in the fray.
While State unit of the BJP has completely failed to woo any of the four Independent and Other MLAs, who hold key for second seat of the Legislative Council, BJP national president Amit Shah today made last ditch efforts to woo some of the Independents by personally calling up one of them on telephone from Bhubaneswar in Orissa where BJP’s two-day national executive was on.
Three candidates in fray for two seats of Jammu division included Abdul Qayoom Dar (PDP), Vikram Randhawa (BJP) and Thakur Balbir Singh (Congress). As per PDP-BJP agreement, Dar will be given safe passage to the Council with 30 votes as BJP had already won two Council seats uncontested on April 3 including GL Raina alias Ajay Bharti from Kashmir and Pardeep Sharma from Poonch while PDP got only one-Yasir Reshi from Kashmir. Fourth uncontested seat had gone to NC, whose nominee Aga Syed Mehmood Al Mousvi won on Kashmir seat.
After 30 votes of Dar, PDP-BJP joint candidate, Vikram Randhawa will have 28 while Congress-NC joint candidate Thakur Balbir Singh has 27. Four Independents and Others now hold the key for the second seat, for which there will be tough contest between Randhawa and Balbir.
Chief Minister and PDP president Mehbooba Mufti immediately on her arrival here this evening after three-day visit to New Delhi, chaired meeting of the senior PDP leaders including Ministers and MLAs, where the issue of Legislative Council elections surfaced prominently.
Mehbooba discussed the issue of elections with senior party leaders. Sources said the BJP leaders couldn’t make it to the meeting as Deputy Chief Minister Dr Nirmal Singh and State president Sat Sharma CA were in Bhubaneswar and will reach here only tomorrow morning.
On the other, National Conference president Dr Farooq Abdullah and working president Omar Abdullah also reached here this afternoon and met senior party leaders including legislators to give final touch to the voting pattern to ensure victory of joint opposition candidate Thakur Balbir Singh. NC and Congress were in alliance for Lok Sabha by-polls. While they won Srinagar Lok Sabha seat yesterday with Farooq Abdullah emerging victorious, Anantnag will go to polls on May 25.
After NC meeting, joint meeting of NC and Congress Legislature Parties was held tonight over dinner in which Council election strategy was finalized.
Meanwhile, Legislature Party leaders of all four major parties including PDP, BJP, NC and Congress have directed their MLAs to reach Jammu and cast their votes in favour of their respective candidates. The Chief Whips of the parties have also issued whips to their MLAs.
Insiders in both the parties told the Excelsior that after State unit of the BJP was unable to woo any of the four Independent and Others, Amit Shah rang up some of them including Pawan Gupta, a former BJP ally and MLA Udhampur and sought his vote for the party on the ground that the Congress shouldn’t win the seat.
Sources said some senior leaders of BJP as well as Congress have also spoken to four MLAs, who apart from Pawan Gupta, included MY Tarigami (CPM), Hakim Mohammad Yasin (PDF) and Engineer Abdul Rashid (Langate). Tarigami was in Jaipur, Rajasthan in connection with a party function but his aide said he would be back  late tonight or tomorrow.
As usual all four legislators didn’t speak clearly on whom they would vote and whether they would cast their vote or abstain.
Sources said Pawan Gupta is reported to have told Amit Shah that BJP State unit leaders as well as a national leader, Incharge of the party, were responsible for present mess in the State and he should immediately act against them. However, Gupta didn’t make any commitment to Shah on voting the BJP candidate.
Sources said both BJP and Congress have mobilized their top party leaders also to secure votes of Independents and Others. Congress State unit leaders, unlike the BJP, have also personally approached all four MLAs whose vote hold key to their victory.
While Congress candidate required three votes for straight victory, which will take his votes from 27 to 30, BJP required only two votes to make it to 30 as they already have 28 votes after polling 30 to PDP candidate Abdul Qayoom Dar. The abstentions by any of the four MLAs could also impact the result.
Meanwhile, Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Shantmanu, who is ex-officio CEO and Observer for Legislative Council elections on behalf of the Election Commission of India told the Excelsior that entire election of tomorrow will be webcasted to ensure complete transparency.
“We are videographing the entire election process, which will start at 9 am and conclude at 4 pm. Counting of votes will be taken up immediately after the completion of election process and the result would be declared by 7 pm,” Shantmanu, who reviewed the election arrangements with top officials including Returning Officer Mohammad Ramzan this evening, said.
Ramzan said that it will be an open ballot system in which the Polling Agents appointed by the candidates can see the votes of the MLAs of their parties.

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